


Emissary

by Lyrstzha



Category: Whyborne and Griffin - Jordan L. Hawk
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Awkward Flirting, F/F, Impossible Colors, Interspecies Romance, Ketoi, Kissing, Lovecraftian, Misses Clause Challenge, Misunderstandings, NOT canon compliant with Undertow, Non-Human Humanoid Society, POV Female Character, POV First Person, POV Minor Character, Period-Typical Homophobia, Personified Cities, background Percival Whyborne/Griffin Flaherty, canon compliant with Fallow, courting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-18
Updated: 2016-12-18
Packaged: 2018-09-09 12:22:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8890609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyrstzha/pseuds/Lyrstzha
Summary: “One for the land, one for the sea,” my mother finally sang under her breath in a low chant. “That'll mean something to us all, right enough, but especially to you.” She shook her head and looked away, back toward my laughing sisters and brother in the salt spray. “Good thing our blood have always been people of the tide, my girl. You can see the farthest in all directions, standing on the threshold. You might get hit by the door once in a while, but at least you can choose which side of it to stand on.”





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lessthanpie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lessthanpie/gifts).



> Lessthanpie: Your prompt was short and open, so I was not sure, but I hope this is somewhat like what you had in mind. It is, at least, the general direction I honestly think canon is going to go.
> 
> ETA: Now that _Undertow_ is out, this is now an AU version of how this romance could have budded. Tags have been adjusted accordingly.

At first, I did not realize that I dreamed. The beginning was stitched together out of memories, so it seemed as real as it had, indeed, been.

The well-known streets of Widdershins lay around me in the darkness just before dawn, and I walked confidently along the familiar way to my boarding house, sure of my path despite the gloom. Beside me paced the strapping figure of Persephone Whyborne, her eyes alertly scouring the dim corners all around us for danger. We had set out from Dr. Whyborne's home chattering about plans for Dr. Putnam's wedding, but we had fallen quiet as we traversed the narrower streets near my neighborhood. During the day it tended to seem merely cramped, but at night these winding streets with their few flickering gas lamps could take on a slightly sinister air, even on an evening I had not spent fleeing for my life from some horrible rat-thing abomination.

One of Persephone's clawed hands rested protectively just at the small of my back, as if she were prepared to pull me from the path of danger at any moment – which I had every faith that she would. The thought was oddly thrilling, and as we walked I felt the glow of a flush heating my face for no reason I could name.

“Miss Parkhurst,” she began softly, her gaze briefly skating across mine before roving the darkness once more.

“Maggie, please,” I insisted, feeling bold. “You've risked yourself to save my life tonight! And we're planning a wedding together. I – I mean,” I choked, my flush flaring into what was no doubt a spectacular blush. Why had I such a gift for saying the most awkward things in front of the most important people? I seemed especially prone to it before Whybornes of any kind. “We are planning together for a wedding. Of other people.” I cleared my throat desperately. “Surely we're past the formalities.”

“Maggie,” she repeated, with a quick flash of razor-toothed smile that glinted in the faint light of the gas streetlamps above. But then her brow furrowed, the creases looking a trifle smoother than a human frown. “I don't understand the formalities,” she grumbled. “There seem to be such a lot of rules, and they're all so complicated. Brother's husband says that I need not concern myself so much about them with family, but I thought I should try with you.” She darted another glace at me furtively, but I was too busy reeling to return it.

Brother's husband? Oh, but of course – that explained so much I had never understood properly, and so much I had chosen to ignore. In that moment, many things became clear to me, as if my life were a distant landscape upon which I had finally twisted Dr. Putnam's field glasses into focus. How had I been such a fool? Dr. Whyborne was far too kind a soul to have been laughing at me all this time, but how my awkward, unwelcome attentions must have importuned him! The charity of his gentleness with me was mortifying to think on. I did not realize I had stopped dead in the lane until Persephone pulled me against her side in obvious alarm.

“Maggie! Are you well?” She looked wildly around us, but, seeing no one, peered down into my face intently.

“Sorry,” I gasped out. “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to alarm you.”

Her arm around me tightened slightly, pressing me into her lithely muscled flank. “I don't understand. What's wrong?”

“Nothing,” I sighed, and closed my eyes for a moment to retreat into my humiliation in some semblance of privacy. “You're right; our rules are all so complicated.”

“I still don't understand,” she said. But her claws whispered carefully through my disordered hair in a gentle stroke, and it felt a great deal more soothing than I would have thought.

A small giggle that bordered on the hysterical bubbled up out of my throat. “But I do, now.” I opened my eyes and tipped my chin back to look up at Persephone. In the shadows, I could barely make out the faint stirring of her tentacled hair or the curves of her fins, and she might almost be just another woman – albeit an Amazon, to be sure, and a half-naked one at that. “Never mind,” I assured her. “I was only silly and foolish about something I should have understood ages ago, and there's nothing new about that. It's of no consequence. Just like me,” I added, my words honestly more wistful than bitter.

She tilted her head thoughtfully. “You don't seem silly and foolish to me at all,” she countered firmly. “And definitely not inconsequential.” Her keen gaze held mine inescapably, and there was something about her countenance that seemed inexplicably yet arrestingly lit from within. I had always imagined the same of her brother's face; perhaps it ran in the family. Was I simply sensitive to the magnetism of Whybornes as a general thing? Though, of course, not in the same way!

I practically felt my tongue actually tie itself into a knot in my mouth, and for some reason I was abruptly acutely aware of every place her bare flesh pressed against me; I supposed perhaps my sense of modesty was finally catching up to the hectic pace of the evening to pay proper heed to Persephone's lack of attire. It occurred to me suddenly that she was lovely, really, in a wondrously exotic and mythical way. Perhaps I should have found her terrible and alien, but I looked upon her shining face and found it beautiful.

“Well,” I finally managed, sounding hoarse even to my own ears. “We've only just become properly acquainted tonight. Give it time.”

“Agreed,” she said immediately, with a decisive nod and a sharp smile that looked satisfied. I had the feeling that I had just made a bargain without meaning to, but somehow the tingle in my belly was warm anticipation instead of wariness. It was almost as though I could sense the shape of a future looming before me, exciting and unexpected and a little terrifying.

And then, in the way of dreams, the memory of that night blurred and shifted until I was no longer making my way home after a harrowing night with a ferociously beautiful ketoi as my guard, but standing on a deserted stretch of shore with my mother on a bright summer morning. My three younger siblings jostled each other at the water's edge, digging for clams in the wet sand and water-smoothed rocks.

“Their roads will be easier,” my mother said, watching them with the faraway look in her eyes that she often had. Many strange, small talents take up residence in the blood of families who live long in Widdershins, and the women of our line sometimes had a bit of a gift for foresight – not that I had ever shared that ability with my mother. “Easier,” she continued, “but in ways both safer and smaller.”

“What will I be, Mama?” I asked her with all the faith of a child.

She looked at me, or through me, and gave a squinting frown as if she were trying to stare into the sun. “I can't see the shape of it, exactly,” she said. “It's peculiar, I can tell you that.” She was silent a moment, still blinking at me. “One for the land, one for the sea,” she finally sang under her breath in a low chant. “That'll mean something to us all, right enough, but especially to you.” She shook her head and looked away, back toward my laughing sisters and brother in the salt spray. “Good thing our blood have always been people of the tide, my girl. You can see the farthest in all directions, standing on the threshold. You might get hit by the door once in a while, but at least you can choose which side of it to stand on.”

“I don't understand, Mama,” I complained, completely bewildered. “What should I do?”

She shrugged and waved a hand as if she were brushing away cobwebs into the ocean breeze. “You'll know when you know,” she said cryptically. “Which is more than I can say for most. Widdershins will know you for her own; that much I can tell you for certain.”

“But that's no help at all,” I protested.

My usually sober mother threw back her back her head and laughed from the depths of her belly. “Oh, child! Of course divining is no _help_. It's no more than a sense of the world as an ocean. All dazzling glitter on the surface, but with dark things moving in the fathoms below. Perhaps sometimes we catch enough of a glimpse to guess the shape of those things, but mostly,” she sighed and carded her fingers through my hair, much as Persephone would do years later, “we see just enough to know how very small we are. And how very far from any friendly shore.”

I shivered in spite of the warm sunshine and tasted the salt of the ocean in the wind on my tongue. It tasted almost like tears, but sharper and colder. “Friendly shore?” I asked in a whisper, uncertain and unnerved.

But the world blurred again and then I was swimming beneath the waves, smoothly and deftly as if I was in my element. I did not seem to need air to breathe, and I could see more clearly in the murky water than I should have done. I dove and kicked, stroking desperately forward in the certainty that something malevolent hunted me through the depths of the frigid sea. Something that loomed behind me like a shadow I could feel crawling across my bare back, and I dared not glance over my shoulder to see what it was. I had a horrible certainty that it would be worse to know exactly what stalked me. 

I marshaled my fading strength and put forth a burst of speed, coursing ahead into an undersea cavern that twisted into mephitic tunnels stretching into Stygian darkness all around me. I quailed at the thought of diving into that foul labyrinth, but my pursuer was too terrible and too close behind me to hesitate. I threw myself into the blind darkness, my hands outstretched to catch and guide myself along the slimy, sharp rock of the passage wall. The rough surface left stinging scrapes on my palms, but I scrabbled heedlessly at it anyway, pulling myself along.

And yet I knew in my bones that it would not be enough. That which hunted me could not be lost in the darkness, for it _was_ darkness. I tried to scream into the muffling water as I felt an oddly formless grip close about my left ankle. I kicked desperately, like a hare caught in the talons of a hawk. The very last thing I wanted to do was to turn and face the thing behind me, but I began to twist around to fight with a despairing cry...

 

“Maggie!” A pounding on my door wrenched me awake from the clinging depths of formless nightmare with a strangled gasp, and for a moment I was not sure if I still dreamed. “Oh, Maggie, come and see!” jolted me even further into consciousness.

“What?” I called out shakily, my voice thick and cracked with sleep. I blinked in the dim room; morning light was not yet more than a pale, soft glow around the edges of my curtains, and the shadowed shapes of my sparse furnishings seemed somehow unfamiliar, as if they were drawn straight from my troubled dreams.

“Just come and see!” the voice yelled through the door, and I finally gathered enough of my wits to place it as belonging to Lydia, who rented the room beside mine.

I flailed out of my warm bed and into my robe with even less grace than usual, still just a bit out of step. When I stumbled my way to the door, Lydia was still there, breathless and clutching a lantern that threw wild shadows in her trembling hand.

“What on earth?” I demanded. “Is – is the city afire?” It did not seem likely, as wet as the weather had been lately – though really, in Widdershins, one could never tell – but it was less unnerving than asking if hooded figures were roaming the streets or freak tidal waves were sweeping through the bay. I had grown up in this odd town, after all, so like all long-time residents, I knew better than to ask some questions aloud if I could help it. 

“Oh, I don't _think_ so,” she said dubiously, but was apparently unwilling to commit herself to a definite no, probably because Lydia, too, had grown to womanhood in Widdershins. “But you know how the old folks talk of the Great Auroral Storm of 1859? I think it must be like that.”

“Gracious,” I murmured vaguely, and let her pull me by the wrist down the stairs to our front door. As we stepped outside, I could immediately see what she had meant. There was a strange, faintly luminous glow in the sky, which I had mistaken through my curtains for the light of approaching dawn. It was an impossible color I could not name, something that lurked uneasily between blue and yellow and made my eyes want to cross. It seemed to originate from nowhere in particular. All around us, our neighbors stood on their stoops, likewise looking up into the heavens and speaking to each other in hushed tones.

“How long has _this_ been going on?” I asked urgently, already wondering if I ought to dispatch a telegraph to Dr. Whyborne and Mr. Flaherty in Kansas.

“Not above a half hour,” Lydia answered. “I was awake already – sewing, you know, because I had a few more dresses to finish for tomorrow – when it suddenly struck me that it was easier to see my stitches than it ought to be. I can't have failed to notice for very long.”

I nodded. Lydia worked as a shop girl in a modest yet respectable department store by day, but she also did a bit of garment finishing by night, as she could get the work. It made me tired just to think of it, but if I'd had to help support a widowed sister and her five children as Lydia did, I would surely have done likewise.

“What would you call that color? Blue? Yellow? That ought to make it green, I think, but that is most certainly not green,” I mused.

Lydia shrugged. “It reminds me a bit of the colors you see if your press your fists hard against your eyelids.”

She had a point; it did, rather. But whose fists might be pressing against the eyelids of the world tonight? That was not at all a comforting thought.

We watched a while longer, until the aurora began to be subsumed into the actual light of dawn.

“There's an hour of sewing I shan't get back,” Lydia finally sighed, pragmatism eclipsing the uncanny just as the dawn had eclipsed the unnatural light. It was another sign of a true Widdershins native.

“I suppose we'd best get on,” I agreed. “There doesn't seem to be anything more to see right now, and I ought to have been dressed already.” Should I send a telegraph to Kansas after all, or was this simply an innocent astronomical phenomenon, as the Great Auroral Storm of 1859 Lydia had likened it to? I hated to panic unnecessarily, but what if I sent no warning and it truly _was_ trouble? Surely it seemed harmless enough, for the moment. Perhaps I should keep an eye out, but await further developments before doing anything rash. Yes, that did seem the wisest course.

Back within my tiny room, I found myself distracted and slower than usual in preparing myself for the day. Before I knew it, I was even further behind time and had to rush through dressing. I buttoned up my shirtwaist hastily, missing buttons in my hurry and having to start all over again twice. I could tell it was going to be a trying day already, even aside from mysterious auroras of unnatural colors in the sky. I always made such a diligent effort to be immaculate and well turned-out – and not merely to catch the eye of good Dr. Whyborne, a foolish dream I had finally surrendered anyway. No, I was conscious of the lingering sense of skepticism about working women like myself, of the need to be always extra professional and above reproach. I was determined that no one should look askance at working women because of _me_. My own parents had been leery of my desire to pursue work at the Ladysmith, in spite of my mother's certainty about my peculiar fate. What they might have thought if I'd been bold enough to have dreams like Dr. Putnam's, I dared not imagine.

As I pinned my hat carefully over my hair, my eye caught on a wisp of ivory silk peeking from beneath my mattress. Had I not tucked it securely out of sight? I could swear that I had. Perhaps I had tossed in my sleep and shifted the bed enough to uncover it...? Yes, surely that was all. 

But as I bent to push it back out of sight, the silk snagged on one of my fingernails. I paused to pull it gently free, and I could swear that it seemed to cling to my fingers a little. Without quite knowing why, I found myself digging the little bundle fully out and tucking it into my pocket, where it almost seemed to nestle. Perhaps so long as I did not unwrap it – let alone _use it_ , for goodness' sake – it would be all right to carry it with me to the Ladysmith. Yes, surely that would do no harm. Perhaps the thought of Persephone Whyborne, protecting me in all her fierce glory, might settle my nerves a bit on the sort of day that I sensed was in store for me. Not that thinking of Persephone precisely settled my nerves as a general rule; she was somehow paradoxically both comforting and profoundly flustering to contemplate. Nevertheless, I left the silk-wrapped summoning stone secreted in my pocket before tripping down the stairs just in time to miss my trolley. It was, indeed, going to be one of those days.

 

While Dr. Whyborne was off in Kansas, of course there was a bit less for me to do, but not so much less as one might think. If he were going to be away longer, I'd have been obliged to return to the general secretarial pool, but as it was I still had enough to keep me busy until his return. I still had his official correspondence to sort and answer as best I could, some cataloging he'd left for me, and all manner of samples, photographs, and transcriptions needing translation to categorize and place in neatly ordered piles on his already hopelessly cluttered desk. For that matter, I still had a small pile of his handwritten translations to type neatly and either file with Mr. Quinn in the library or return to the various supplicants who'd requested them. That last went somewhat more quickly without Dr. Whyborne himself plaintively asking why his handwritten copy would not suffice perfectly well for official purposes every time I took another set of pages from him to reproduce them in neat type with my “infernal clacking machine,” as he called it.

“I say, Miss Parkhurst, is Dr. Whyborne still not yet returned?” I looked up from my desk to find Dr. Gerritson blinking inquisitively at me, reminding me, as always, of a slightly befuddled yet kindly-disposed badger.

“I'm sorry,” I told him sincerely, even though I had answered this question at least half a dozen times since Dr. Whyborne's rather abrupt departure for Kansas to investigate the origin of an artifact. “Not as of yet.”

“Perhaps a bit later this morning?”

I repressed a sigh. “I would like to say so, but I really don't know. I promise I'll come let you know when he's in.”

“Very kind,” Dr. Gerritson nodded at me. “I'd like to get his opinion on an unusual inscription sent to me by Professor Angell of Brown as soon as possible. Quite bizarre, really. Might you drop this on top of his pile of things to do when he returns?” Dr. Gerritson handed across a slim folio tied up with string and labeled only in a scrawl which appeared mostly illegible to me aside from a “Ct” at the beginning and a “lu” at the end; no doubt Dr. Whyborne's formidable talent with languages would prove more equal to the task of deciphering it.

“Of course,” I assured him. “I'll see he gets to it directly. Is there anything I can do for you in the meanwhile?” It was only polite to ask, surely, though of course Edith Whateley, his own secretary, took excellent care of him. She had even proven equal to the task of keeping him from wandering outside of his office in ladies' underthings, which I was not at all sure I could have done. He did get up quite a bit of steam sometimes, after all. I rather suspected that was the entire reason Dr. Hart had given him a secretary, in fact.

“No, no, my dear. Thank you.” And with a tip of the hat he was not actually wearing, he was off, probably to go and ask if Dr. Putnam was yet returned either – though of course she was not, since, as everyone knew, she'd gone with Dr. Whyborne to Kansas. I repressed another sigh and allowed the tip of my left thumb to dip into my pocket to whisper across the silk wrapping that lay inside, swaddling the summoning stone Persephone Whyborne had passed along to me through her brother.

I let the soft caress of the silk slip beneath my finger, back and forth, and I felt an unaccountable shiver dance up my spine, even though the morning was fair and warm. I snatched my hand back up to press it firmly against the safety of my desk blotter. What was I doing? It was one thing for someone like Dr. Whyborne to wield such powers, but for a silly girl like myself? I was no one, not really – I just stood near people who were, sometimes. But for all that I kept reminding myself of that, not a day went by that I didn't trail a wistful hand across that silk wrapping as if it enclosed some sort of comforting talisman. Why had that startlingly beautiful ketoi woman sent me such a thing? What could she possibly mean by it? Surely she had not meant for me to call her out of the water just because she wanted to see me again...

Before I knew what I was doing, my hand crept back toward my pocket like iron to a lodestone.

“Miss Parkhurst,” intoned a deep, funereal voice behind me, and I startled badly, snatching my hand back from my pocket guiltily, as if I'd been caught doing something illicit. “This missive has arrived for Widdershins. It appears to be of some urgency.”

I turned to find Mr. Quinn looming there, looking quite as dour as ever, like a bookish raven portending doom. I had gradually grown accustomed to his sometimes referring to Dr. Whyborne as Widdershins over these last two years, though I was unsure why he did so and not especially inclined to ask him. He was forbidding at the best of times, even before the outlandish rumors that he had led a battalion of librarians into battle against a horde of madmen and unearthly monsters began to circulate.

I reached out a hand for the envelope he held. “Thank you,” I said, not bothering to ask why our head librarian might be delivering the post. Our librarians were terribly eccentric after all, and none moreso than Mr. Quinn; it would hardly be the strangest thing I had ever caught one of them doing. “I shall leave it on his desk and draw his attention to it as soon as he returns.”

“Ah,” he hummed, putting the letter in my hand but not quite releasing it into my hold. “I think it might be best if you were to open it yourself directly. As his handmaiden, it falls to you to act as his proxy should the situation call for such in his absence.”

I blinked at him, thoroughly nonplussed. “As his _what_?” I squeaked, my voice shrilling higher in disbelief.

“Handmaiden,” he repeated. “Proxy.”

That helped not at all. “But I'm no scholar!” I protested weakly, not even bothering to address his titling of me as a handmaiden. “Let alone a...” I gestured vaguely, not quite willing to say “sorcerer” aloud where anyone might hear.

Mr. Quinn let go of the letter. “We all must soldier on as best we can,” he said quellingly, with a faint air of reproach.

“But...!” I tried again, but he was already striding away in that eerily silent way he had, without so much as a discernible scuff of shoe-heel.

I looked helplessly down at the white envelope clutched in my hand. It was, indeed, addressed to “Widdershins” in a flowing, spidery hand, though it lacked any other marking, including any postage. What may have marked it urgent to Mr. Quinn, I could not tell. Perhaps the manner of its delivery – or its deliverer? – might explain that. I resolved not to ask him if I could help it. If he'd had anything helpful he wished to add, he would surely have done so already.

I turned the letter over a few times in consternation. A faint musty odor, like mud from the bank of a sluggish river delta, wafted up as I fanned the paper back and forth. Should I dare? I did, after all, open official correspondence for Dr. Whyborne in his absence – though I could not say this appeared to be exactly official, as such. 

“In for a penny,” I muttered under my breath, and reached for my letter-opener. I never had stood upon a height without having to curb the wild urge to throw myself from it, but I had learned early the value of prudence for a woman in this world. But perhaps it was finally time to throw myself from a height after all – metaphorically, of course. I unfolded the heavy paper to find more of the sprawling, spidery hand comprising a short note.

_Widdershins,_

_It has come to Our attention that Unexpected Events likely pertaining to the Restoration have transpired this morning. We therefore believe it to be in Our mutual best interest to meet at last and discuss Our common good. We shall arrive this evening by the 8:45 train, and shall seek You at Your place of residence._

_Arkham_

I squinted at the sprawling flourishes of the signature, as if it would make more sense that way. It did not. Arkham? Was there someone called so, just as Dr. Whyborne was sometimes called Widdershins? Surely that was the most probable answer. But what events, and restoration of what? Did those events include whatever had happened to the sky last night? And why should Arkham demand a meeting to discuss them? And, oh goodness, did I need to go as Dr. Whyborne's representative? Surely not!

“Surely not,” I repeated aloud, my voice very small in the still room. What on earth good could _I_ be at such a meeting? And yet...

I did so _wish_ I might be of some use. Oh, to be even a fraction as heroic as one of the Whyborne twins, or even Dr. Putnam or Mr. Flaherty! But I knew very well I was passably bright but not brilliant, and possessed no particular acumen outside of my secretarial work. Even in my most charitable estimation, my relevant practical skills amounted to a hodgepodge of snippets of exotic languages I had gleaned from Dr. Whyborne and some rudimentary advice on self-defense I had gotten from Dr. Putnam years ago. I supposed I might possibly be equal to pronouncing a few phrases of Aklo and stabbing an assailant with one of my hat-pins. It was very little to be going on with, especially if Mr. Quinn was correct about the urgency of the situation. I resolved to telegraph Dr. Whyborne at once for instruction after all.

 

By the end of the day, I was quite beside myself. No answer had come from Dr. Whyborne, and I could only hope he and the others were all right out there in the Kansan wilderness. But it seemed I would have to muddle through as best I could without his guidance.

Of course I knew where Dr. Whyborne and Mr. Flaherty's house could be found; I had been there before myself – run there in panic through the night-time streets, in fact. So I certainly knew where to find this meeting, if I dared go. And I really thought I had better dare – but perhaps not alone. 

As soon as the sun sank over the waves with a last flash of green light, I flung the summoning stone as far out into the sea as I could. The deserted stretch of beach was eerie and unsettling in the darkness, not to mention cold as the chilling wind swept in off the bay to scour the dunes. I shivered in my coat and prayed – not for the first, or even the tenth, time – that Persephone would answer, and soon. I was not quite sure what I would do if a another ketoi came to my call instead. Make polite conversation about the weather? Really? Worse if it were Mrs. Whyborne herself, though I was not quite sure why that should be so terrifying a thought. Probably I only feared my propensity for making a fool of myself in front of Whybornes, happily somewhat subdued with the twins by dint of practice, would be in full force with her.

The first sign I saw for certain was moonlight glinting off of a razor-toothed smile, like a more deadly Cheshire cat, in the surf near the shore. I breathed a sigh of relief as Persephone Whyborne strode inland from the waves, her sleek skin glistening.

“Maggie!” she called cheerfully, as I moved to meet her at the water's edge.

“Persephone,” I called back, waving. I could not help but return her delighted grin; it struck me that no one had ever looked so quite so happy simply to see me before.

“I hoped you'd call to me,” she declared as she drew near. “That is, I _thought_ you wanted to, but when you didn't use the stone right away, I thought maybe I had misunderstood.”

I opened my mouth to ask what she meant, but by then she had reached where I stood, just out of range of the lapping tide, and seized me firmly around the waist with both arms. The words that had started to form on my tongue dissolved into a slight yelp as she lifted me easily against her chest and bent her head to press her mouth against my own. Her lips were cool and salty and only slightly parted, so that they still covered her shark-like teeth; she moved them back and forth more like nuzzling than kissing. After a dizzying moment, it occurred to me that I could taste the salt on her skin because the tip of my tongue was slightly tickling at her lower lip and gradually venturing further. Abruptly I came back to my senses and went rigid in her hold.

I did not jerk my head back, but Persephone drew hers away slowly with a frown. “What!” I panted wildly as she regarded me, still far too close to her and dangling off the ground in more ways than one. “What – what is the meaning of – of...” I sputtered incoherently.

Persephone's frown deepened. “Am I doing this kissing thing wrong? I thought Mother explained it clearly enough, but it isn't something my people do. I know I didn't bite you!”

“No, that – that is not the issue!” I gasped, still not able to hash out a thought to save my life. She'd asked her _mother_ about this?

“If that's not wrong, then....did you not call me to be your wife of the sea? I thought...” she trailed off and looked horribly stricken and abashed. “Oh,” she said in a smaller voice, and gently set me back down on my feet. “I'm sorry. That's what land-dwellers usually use the stones for.”

“No,” I countered immediately, reaching out to clutch at her shoulders with both hands. I wasn't sure what I was doing, but I could feel the moment around me shattering in ways that were utterly wrong, and the pained expression on her beautiful face was absolutely intolerable. “No, I remember, you did mention that.” And she had, as we decorated the hall together for Christine Putnam's wedding; I'd blushed and thought it an idle remark, if somewhat racy. Obviously not. “ _I'm_ sorry I didn't understand.”

“Your people are confusing,” she declared miserably. “I would make a very good wife. I'm a chieftess, you know. And my brother is teaching me sorcery. I've bested many fearsome enemies.” She paused for a moment, and tentatively laid one of her larger hands over mine. “And I would be good to you,” she said more softly. “I would protect you, and visit you faithfully whenever I could. I would cherish you beyond all others. I would even give you my favorite spear, if you wanted it.”

I'd found myself holding my breath as she spoke, but I couldn't help letting it out in a slight giggle at that last. “I appreciate that,” I told her quickly, hoping to forestall her thinking that I was laughing at her. “I am certain you would make an excellent wife indeed.”

She shook her head, tentacle-hair undulating fretfully. “Then why don't you want me?” she asked forthrightly, so much braver in her vulnerability than I could imagine ever being. “Is this because of your people's odd strictures about love? Like it is for my brother and his husband?”

“Er,” I temporized, honestly not sure how to answer her. Why didn't I want her, again? I knew I'd put the thought from my mind as impossible, but I could not quite grasp the reason for that at just this moment. Who could stand before this astonishing creature and not want her? “I mean,” I tried again, “it's true that such a – a – _union_ ,” I swallowed hard, feeling a fierce blush blazing in my cheeks and trying not to imagine what such a union might entail. “Well. It would be considered scandalous, to say the least. Abominable, by many.” Which it would, and not simply because she wasn't human.

“Abominable?” she demanded, sounding indignant.

“Not to me,” I hastened to assure her. “Never to me.”

Persephone glanced down at where her clawed hand still covered mine. “Then _why_?” she asked again.

“I,” I started, but still could think of no reason to give her. She raised her gaze to mine again and I felt myself swaying forward slightly, as if I were falling into her eyes. “I came because I need your help!” I blurted out abruptly before I could close the distance between us, surprising even myself. We blinked at each other blankly for a moment. “Dr. Whyborne and Mr Flaherty are away, and I didn't know whom else to call in this sort of emergency,” I added more calmly.

Persephone straightened and took her hand away; my own felt colder than the night air should warrant without her touch. The set of her mouth firmed with determination, all vulnerability smoothed away for the moment. “Tell me more about this emergency,” she said decisively.

 

I paced fitfully before Dr. Whyborne's door shortly after 8:45 and tried not to feel like an intruder. Persephone had scaled the wall to the upstairs window and let me inside after a brief but feverish argument over the effrontery of breaking into the house. No doubt she was correct that her brother and Mr. Flaherty would understand and approve our need, but I still felt uncomfortable.

“Cease pacing,” hissed Persephone from the kitchen, where she already lurked to watch over me from concealment. “You only make me more anxious for you.” We had agreed that it would be best to keep her existence secret for the moment to retain the element of surprise in case of attack, but I had to admit that I would feel better if she could stand by my side. I did not even want to think how I would feel were she not there at all.

“I've tried,” I complained. “It's worse when I stop moving; I feel quite ready to be ill when I try to hold still.”

“Perhaps _you_ should hide in the kitchen and _I_ should meet this Arkham,” she suggested, not for the first time. 

“No, no,” I whispered back, though why I whispered in a house empty save for the two of us I wasn't sure. “Let me be useful, at least in some small way. I know I am not so brave as you, but I can do this.”

She was quiet a moment. “You have no magic and are no warrior, yet you step into danger. I think you are braver than I am,” she finally said.

I turned my head toward the kitchen where she stood and felt my shoulders square with resolution. “Oh,” I breathed, overwhelmed and not sure what else to say to tell her what her esteem meant to me. “Thank you,” I murmured inadequately, and felt immediately frustrated with myself.

A few moments later – thankfully for my nerves, which were still quite strung tight with waiting – a carriage rattled up the street and stopped before the house. A firm knock sounded upon the door, and I counted to ten slowly beneath my breath before opening it.

On the other side stood a tall woman of solid build, apparently of middle years, though she wore them gracefully. Her manner of dress reminded me immediately of Dr. Putnam's in that it appeared more sensible than fashionable, but the make of her garments was of distinctly higher quality to my eye. Her dark hair was pulled back severely, leaving the strong bones of her face to stand out all the more starkly, and as decoration she wore only a silver pendant around her neck in the shape of a curving five pointed star with a blood-red garnet winking like an eye at its center. There was an oddly luminous quality to her face, just as there was to Dr. Whyborne's and Persephone's. Goodness, could I actually sense magic somehow? Well, I wished I'd known _that_ before; it seemed like the sort of thing that would have been handy to draw upon these past years.

“Arkham?” I inquired, attempting to sound authoritative and confident.

“You are not Widdershins,” she countered, eyeing me dubiously. It didn't help that she had to look down to do it.

“No,” I agreed. “He is unavailable at present. I am his...” I faltered slightly, before seizing on “Handmaiden.”

“Handmaiden,” she repeated in what struck me as a somewhat sardonic tone, raising one eyebrow and looking no less dubious.

“Handmaiden,” I said again with a firm nod. “Exactly. I am acting as his proxy in this matter,” I added recklessly. “Or, er, emissary.”

She raised her other eyebrow and looked me up and down appraisingly. “I see,” she finally said. She gestured one long-fingered hand at the door. “May I, then? This is not a discussion to be had in public.”

“Oh!” I stepped back to let her pass. “Yes, do. May I, ah, offer you a seat? There's a parlor just upstairs.”

“Thank you, but I have been sitting on the train these last hours and I have had quite enough of that,” she answered briskly, somewhat to my relief, as I preferred to stay close to the kitchen where Persephone hid. “Besides which,” she went on, “time is most probably short, and I have yet another train to catch in any case. We had best skip the pleasantries, I'm afraid.”

“By all means,” I agreed faintly. Belatedly, it occurred to me to add, “Except, shall I just call you Mrs. Arkham, then?” I wanted to ask what it meant, if she was in some way Arkham, but I didn't want to seem as if I didn't already understand.

She faced me squarely and fixed me with an intent gaze. “Just Arkham will do nicely for now, thank you. And I presume you have some name besides Handmaiden?”

“Oh, er, yes,” I fumbled. Why had I not thought about how to answer this question? Should I give her my real name? Probably not, just in case. “Whyborne,” I blurted, utterly mortified to hear it come from my mouth. I had done my best to forget all about my former fantasies of one day being Mrs. Percival Whyborne, and I was definitely not going to think about being Mrs. _Persephone_ Whyborne. “Mrs. Whyborne,” I forged ahead gamely anyway, lifting my chin in a sharp nod. 

“Mrs. Whyborne,” Arkham repeated. Her eyebrow quirked upward again. “I see. Well, Mrs. Whyborne, I fear we're rather at a delicate and dangerous pass these days. I trust Widdershins will be available to act soon, but there is no time to be lost now. You noted the strangely colored lights in the sky last night?”

“Of course. I thought perhaps it was an unusual but natural auroral phenomenon...?”

She snorted indelicately. “Unusual and natural do not go much together these days, alas. No, it was most definitely not natural. Lunatics at the Sanitarium began chanting in unison shortly before the lights began. I have reports of the same from Danvers State Hospital; if Stormhaven still stood, no doubt you would have similar accounts to relate. Besides which, certain artifacts in the care of Miskatonic University were observed to take on a fiendish glow, and Dr. Armitage, the head librarian there, was found naked and raving in the streets, carrying only a torch and our copy of the _Necronomicon_.”

“That...does not sound especially natural,” I agreed. “Do you think this Dr. Armitage caused the disturbance in some way?”

“Normally I'd suspect him,” she nodded. “He's been a much steadier man than any of my previous librarians, though, so I expect it's just that books in the special collection sent him quite out of his senses with their voices, at least temporarily – they do tend to do that, if the veil is thin enough, which is a bad enough sign by itself. And did you note the direction of the lights?”

I frowned thoughtfully, trying to remember. “Now that you mention it, they did seem rather stronger to the south, and perhaps slightly west.”

Arkham's eyes blazed and she shook her finger in the air as if seizing upon a crucial point. “Ah ha! That was chiefly the aim to my stopping here: to see if this was far enough southwest, or if the origin was further on.” When I tilted my head quizzically, she added, “To you and to me, the lights appeared mostly south and a little west, yes. But from New York, reports say the lights appeared to radiate from due northeast.”

“Ah!” I took her direction and was caught up despite myself. “So the source would be located...somewhere in Rhode Island, perhaps? Connecticut?” I pictured a map in my head, and wondered if Persephone might be able to supply reports of sightings from offshore to better triangulate.

“Indeed!” Arkham flashed me a brief, wry smile. “As much as I hate to be away from my city at a time like this, Providence is my next stop. I've always had my suspicions about Providence. Brown doesn't manage these things as well as Miskatonic does.”

“Brown!” I exclaimed, suddenly remembering Dr. Gerritson's request from that very morning. What had he said about the folio he'd handed me for Dr. Whyborne? “I don't suppose a...ah...Professor Angell of Brown might be familiar to you?” Oh dear, ought I not to have mentioned that to her? I might not be the best at this business of subterfuge...

Arkham's gaze sharpened and she stepped closer. I could almost feel Persephone tense in the shadows where she hid. “Professor Angell? No, why? What have you heard?” she demanded.

“It's most likely coincidence,” I insisted, and Arkham snorted derisively again. “It's only that I heard his name this morning, connected to a 'quite bizarre' inscription he'd referred to the Ladysmith for consultation. I didn't think anything of it at the time.”

“I am not putting much faith in coincidence at present. No, I strongly suspect that might be worth further inquiry. Well done, Mrs. Whyborne!” She smiled slightly and regarded me with a great deal more obvious approval than she had upon arrival. “I expected this stop to yield some useful direction, and perhaps an ally to join me on this journey. If this is, as I suspect, connected to the Restoration, it is vital to work together, lest we all perish separately.”

“The Restoration?” I interrupted her quickly. “What makes you think this is connected to...er...that?”

She frowned. “One doesn't observe the Gates opening often, thank goodness, but surely you saw the similarity?”

“Ah, yes. To, um,” I hedged and cleared my throat, trying to look as if I knew what I was talking about.

She squinted at me a little, looking puzzled. “Surely you saw the sky above your own city when the signal was sent last summer,” she said. “It didn't last long before Widdershins managed to silence it, I understand, but you don't miss something like _that_.”

Ah ha! She must mean that fracas on the bridge that had had something to do with Bradley Osborne. “Of course not,” I agreed quickly. “That looked more like a – a _hole_ , though. There was an odd sort of blacker than blue color pouring from it, I suppose, if there is such a thing as a blue darker than black,” I mused.

She huffed and flicked a hand dismissively. “Impossible colors coming from the sky is close enough to worry me, thank you, hole or no hole. For caution's sake, I think we must assume it's related unless we can prove that it isn't. We don't want to be caught napping _now_.”

“Of course not,” I agreed again, nodding sententiously. “That wouldn't do at all.”

“So, will you accompany me to speak to this Professor Angell?” Arkham asked. “I'd hoped for Widdershins, but if you are acting as his emissary...” She shrugged. “You're doing well enough so far, and I'll take what I can get.”

“Oh, I – I am not sure I can be spared,” I gasped, quite torn. “Not while Dr. – I mean, Widdershins, is away.” What was the brave and useful thing to do? And could I trust this woman I had only just met? And really, could I just go gallivanting off to Providence on a mission I only half understood? I was not Dr. Whyborne, to go haring off like a knight-errant, after all!

“Devil take it,” Arkham snapped sharply. “ _None_ of us can be spared! But this could be vital to all of our survival. Are you his emissary, or are you not?” Her eyes flashed a challenge at me, and my spine snapped straight.

“I am,” I declared firmly, feeling reckless and a little light-headed. “Very well; I'll go. But I will need to make arrangements first.”

“If you can make them quickly,” she insisted. “We might leave by the first morning train at six, if you can manage that.”

I could send a note to the Ladysmith pleading illness, I supposed. That should secure me at least a day, probably two. And the Kansas party surely must be returning soon, so I ought to leave a much more detailed and honest note for Dr. Whyborne. But I really should have consulted Persephone before I agreed to anything; I badly wanted to speak to her now.

“I think I can manage that if I begin preparations immediately,” I agreed. “I shall meet you on the platform at a quarter to six.”

Arkham extended her hand for a brief but hearty shake before going to the door, reminding me once again of Dr. Putnam. “Indeed, Mrs. Whyborne. I shall see you in the morning,” she said briskly.

Once she was out the door, I turned immediately to call to Persephone. “She's gone. _Please_ tell me I did the right thing, Persephone. It was all rather like riding on a runaway carriage, and I got quite carried away.”

She stepped out of the darkened kitchen at once. “I was quite proud of you, Maggie!” she exclaimed feelingly. “Of course we must go with her. Either she's to be trusted, in which case this mission could be of the utmost importance, or she isn't, in which case we must foil whatever she is up to.”

I sighed with relief and pressed a hand to my still-racing heart. “I am so glad to hear you say so, that I – wait,” I stopped abruptly, my eyes going wide. “Did you say 'we'?”

Persephone folded her arms across her chest and took on a decidedly mulish expression. “Of course I said 'we.' Did you think I would let you go off with her alone?”

“We can't exactly take you on the train!” I objected at once. “Never mind wandering about the streets of Providence in broad daylight.”

“Is this Providence a coastal town?” she demanded hotly.

“Well, yes,” I allowed.

“Then you can show me, on one of your maps, and I can swim the distance and meet you there.” She reached out for one of my hands and pressed a bundle of damp seaweed into it; I looked down to find it was the summoning stone. “Use this to call me to a meeting place as soon as night falls. Or earlier, if you need me.” Her hand stayed closed around mine. 

“All right,” I agreed faintly, feeling as if my skin were singing where she touched me. I drew in a shuddering breath and looked up into her shining face dreamily.

For a moment, she just looked back at me. I thought we swayed toward each other slightly, as we had on the beach earlier that night. “You told her your name was Mrs. Whyborne,” she finally said. “Do not your women take their partners' family names when they marry? I don't understand it, but Christine told me it's so.”

“That is...the usual custom, yes,” I whispered back, swallowing hard.

“And you know I could claim the family name Whyborne on land?” she prodded.

I had to clear my throat twice before I could get out, “I, um, yes. That is, I did know that. Of course.”

Persephone smiled at me brilliantly, all rows of sharp teeth and joy; her hair curled around her shoulders in delight. “So when you called yourself Mrs. Whyborne, you named yourself my wife after all,” she declared triumphantly.

“Well, I – I suppose it could be seen that way,” I stammered. Why had I denied her, again? I still could not remember. Could it really have been so important if I still could not catch hold of it? Had it really just been the opinion of society? But what did society know, anyway? Society would scorn everything and everyone that really meant anything to me, so why on earth would I heed it now?

“And _you_ see it that way?” she asked fervently, though there was definitely uncertainty around the edges, and I hated to hear it.

“This is all very fast. We've not even courted, let alone been properly engaged,” I objected weakly, but I turned my wrist to grasp her hand in return. Our fingers fit together surprisingly well, and if that wasn't a metaphor, I didn't know what was.

“Oh yes!” She lit up again. “As Christine and Iskander were before their wedding. I remember. You'll have to explain how your people do those parts, because I'm not sure how they go.”

This felt just as dizzying and reckless as agreeing to go off to Providence. “Yes, well,” I giggled, perhaps a trifle punchily. “It wouldn't be the first thing we muddled through together today. But let's say we start with something easy.” I stepped closer and tilted my face up to her like a flower toward the sun.

“Something like kissing?” Persephone asked hopefully but cautiously. Her hair yearned towards me, but she did not close the distance between us. “I liked that better than I expected to.”

“Something like that,” I murmured, going up on my toes to brush my lips carefully over hers. Her arms came immediately around my waist, and she pressed me close. I shivered deliciously and kissed her again, daring to suckle slightly at her bottom lip; she made a small, startled sound in her throat and my feet left the ground again as she caught me up. “And perhaps you might show me how your people court,” I sighed into the close space between her mouth and mine, once I'd finally pulled back a little.

“Gladly,” she breathed huskily, and I honestly forgot every dark thing that might exist in the world or beyond it for a little while.

**Author's Note:**

> The [Great Auroral Storm of 1859](http://arstechnica.com/science/2012/05/1859s-great-auroral-stormthe-week-the-sun-touched-the-earth/), or Carrington Event, was an actual historical solar storm. It disrupted electrical devices such as the telegraph and produced fantastic lights in the sky worldwide. [Impossible colors](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_color) are also a real phenomenon, if very difficult to describe adequately.


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